The Current - More people are running marathons. What does it really take?

Episode Date: May 5, 2025

Record numbers of people are running marathons around the world, with tens of thousands completing the Toronto and Vancouver marathons this weekend. We dig into the appeal with Professor Fran Garrad-Cole, who oversees a university course on what it takes, both physically and psychologically.

1942, Europe. Soldiers find a boy surviving alone in the woods. They make him a member of Hitler's army. But what no one would know for decades, he was Jewish. Could a story so unbelievable be true? I'm Dan Goldberg. I'm from CBC's Personally, Toy Soldier. Available now wherever you get your podcasts. This is a CBC podcast. Hello, I'm Matt Galloway and this is The Current Podcast. Vancouver Marathon Champion for a third time in a row. It's Dana Pitaroski. Woohoo Dana! What an effort. What an effort. Congratulations. Makes me get choked up Kate every time. It's such an effort. Oh my gosh.

That's the call as Canada's very own Dana Pitaroski was the first woman to cross the finish line in yesterday's Vancouver Marathon. A record-breaking 25,000 people ran the 26.2 mile route just over 42 kilometers. I can bet there are a lot of sore legs in this country today. About 13,000 people also ran the Toronto Marathon yesterday. Marathon running is booming. Last month the London Marathon broke the world record for the number of finishers. Just over 56,000 people completed that race and there are a record-breaking number of applicants for this year's New York City Marathon as well.

Who's in the fall tomorrow? Oh, okay! Everybody turn around and give this person beside you a high five. Congratulations! This is your victory lap! You've got the train in, 16 weeks are done! Now you're going to have some fun tomorrow. Thank you all for coming here, I'm going to pass you a ticket.

The morning before the Vancouver Marathon, our producer, Cece Armstrong, went to what's 16 weeks are done! There you're going to have some fun tomorrow. Thank you all for coming here. The morning before the Vancouver Marathon, our producer, CeCe Armstrong, went to what's called the ShakeOut run. This is a short jog before the big race to loosen up your muscles, shake out the nerves. And she went to ask about the appeal of running 26.2 miles.

Welcome to Vancouver for the first time! Yeah! Welcome to Vancouver. Okay, we're gonna get warmed up. I want everybody to spread it. Veronica Skye is a local runner, founder of the Vancouver-based Mondays Run Club, and she thinks community is a big reason

that marathon running is so popular these days. It's more than just running. I think people find a sense of belonging. I think they find a sense of self, and I think they find, again, a sense of pride with running think they find a sense of self and I think they find again a sense of pride with running and especially with the training. I think the marathon is really just the prize at the end. It's a really exciting time of year. Thousands and thousands of runners are coming together from all different types of communities, backgrounds to give

it all they've got I think. Barry Donnelly is running his first marathon. Why would he do such a thing? Good question. I ask myself that every day and every training run that I go on. I think it was more sense of accomplishment. I've done lots of half marathons and for me, it was like just getting to the start line and getting across the finish line to say that I've completed a marathon.

I never ever thought I would ever get near a marathon distance, especially seven years ago when I started doing 3K around Falls Creek here in Vancouver. Never thought I'd get to 42.2K. So I guess that's it. That's what I'm excited about. Maybe I'm crazy, I don't know. Barry says he agrees with Veronica

that a big part of the uptick in runners is all about community. There's high energy, but lots of fun, lots of backslap. Everybody's excited to be here and willing to cheer people on. I think that's one of the coolest things. It's in the media more as well. Athletics is experiencing a boom too so there's more on TV, you hear more about it. Lots of world records have been broken. Super shoes are all around us.

So there's lots of many reasons. Those are probably just a few. It's not just first time marathoners here today. There are some long time long distance runners as well. People like Tracy Dabbs. She is wearing a newly minted light blue 2025 Boston Marathon windbreaker. It is a precious piece of well earned merchandise from completing her third of the seven major marathons just three weeks ago. Crossing that finish line is, yeah, it's amazing.

And you forget about the pain right away. Oh, you know what, when you hit halfway, if you're feeling good, that's when you gotta work a little bit, you know? Just take it hit halfway, if you're feeling good, that's when you got to work a little bit, you know. Just take it easy that first time and enjoy the crowds and enjoy the people, you know, that are cheering you on and you kind of forget about the pain and you just get to the finish line. It's awesome.

So we talked to Barry before yesterday's Vancouver Marathon. He finished the marathon. It was his first one, four hours, 59 minutes, 57 seconds. Congratulations, Barry. Well done and congratulations to everybody who was out hustling yesterday. Running a marathon is a big deal, both physically and psychologically. Fran Garad-Cole is the deputy head of the school of psychology and sports science at Bangor University in Wales. She oversees a course called Born to Run, Achieve Your Goals.

It teaches third year university students how to run a marathon. She's a marathon runner herself. Fran, good morning. Good morning. We just heard from people running this weekend in the Vancouver Marathon. What do you think, and I was talking about the numbers, the numbers are up, it seems like, for races around the world. What is motivating so many people to run 42.2 kilometers? I think the high visibility of running and marathon running that we see now, you know, through social media and just the number of normal people who undertake a marathon means it's

something that ordinary people can aspire to. It's not just for athletes and sporty people and, you know, natural runners. it's for the average person of all sort of ages all walks of life you know anyone probably most people know someone who's run a marathon and they're probably quite like you and so you kind of get to think well maybe I actually can do it so I think that's part of what's driving it. You know I stood out in the pouring rain many many years ago the reason that I started running was because I was standing in the rain watching people run a marathon and I didn't understand what they got that I couldn't, I just couldn't get it. They were in pain, it was miserable, and people were having such a good time. How did you start running?

How did I start running? Oh gosh, that's a good question. So I have three children and I used to find it extremely difficult to find time to go to scheduled gym classes or workouts. So I just got myself a pair of trainers and as and when I had time, I would put my trainers on and run out the front door. And for me, that made it a really cheap, accessible and convenient way to exercise. And that was just, you know, 3K, 4K, nothing very special.

And it sort of built it up from there really. What do you remember about finishing your first marathon? Crying. I think it was the first one. The sheer relief that it was over. So finishing your first marathon? Crying was the first one. The sheer relief that it was over. So my very first marathon, I actually ran with students from the module. So it was the very first year that we delivered the module

at Bangor University. And I ran side by side with two of the students, Imogen and Isabel, that we ran together the whole thing. And it was just such an incredible experience to watch these students that we'd worked with for 18 weeks or 16 weeks weeks or 16 weeks achieve what they set out to do and then sort of do it with them. So it was really, really emotional to finish it. So yeah, definitely that feeling of thank God it's over. This whole thing is so interesting, a course that teaches university students how to run a marathon. Why did you develop such a thing? I mean, there are those,

you know, couch to 5K things that are available, but this is a university level course. That's right, yeah. So, I think it's the only credit bearing module of its type in the world. It was actually inspired by a course that had been run by some lecturers in the University of Iowa back in the sort of 80s and 90s, and they put together a book called The Non-Runners Marathon Trainer, which my husband at the time bought for me. And I sort of was reading this and I was, I've just done my first half marathon, I think, one of my friends

have done one and I thought, gosh, if you can do it, maybe I can. So I had a go and I realized that actually, you know, with enough structure and training and the right program, maybe you can achieve these quite seemingly impossible goals. And I then spoke to my then head of school, Professor John Parkinson, who himself was a very keen marathon runner and positive behavioral psychologist. And I said, we should put this in a module, you know, we should teach them all these theories of psychology and bring it in and like run with them every week. And then we could do it as a module and get them to actually run a half marathon at the end. And he said, brilliant. Yeah, love it. Let's do it. Let's do a full marathon. And of course, I pulled a bit of a face and He said, come on Fran, go hard or go home.

So it kind of started there. So I spoke to arguably the right person or the wrong person, but together we developed this module about 2016 and put it on for the first time then. And what did they learn, the students? What did they learn? So it's a psychology course. So we're very clearly, we're not,

I'm not a sports scientist, I'm a psychologist, as is John, we teach them the psychology of goal setting, really how to achieve difficult goals. So we teach them about, you know, actually how to set goals and action reflection cycles, we look at smart goal settings, differences in motivation and how that can change through goal achievements. We go through all the sorts of different parts of no habits, nudges, behavior change. And the theories that we're teaching them are applicable to any

aspect of life when they want to achieve a difficult goal in the future. And then we pair those theoretical lectures with what we call seminars or running classes every week as well, where we talk about the sort of more nitty gritty about actual running and we share our experiences of, you know, hydration, fueling, pacing, all those things. Then we all go for a run together once a week as well as part of their individual training programs. Tell me more about the psychological things that you teach them, because anybody who does anything

that is physically exerting, I mean, it's a physical workout, but your brain is as deeply engaged and your brain a lot of the times is just telling you to stop because it hurts. Correct, yes, which is a really key signal I think for my bodies. So one of the things, we start out talking about structure. I think one of the key things if you want to achieve certainly this goal, a marathon running goal, is to have a plan. So that's where we start with smart goal setting. So saying, I want to do some running or I'd like to lose weight is great. It's an aspiration,

it's an ambition. But without some actual specifics behind it, like I want to run, for us, it was a Liverpool rock and roll marathon on May the 28th. You know, I've got 16 weeks to train. If you set yourself a specific goal, then you've got to target. So that's really key, I think, for achieving any goal. The next thing to do is then tell people about it.

Be accountable, tell people that this is your intention, and not just, I'm gonna try and run a marathon, but I am running a marathon in May. So being accountable is really, really important for achieving that goal. And there's something about doing it together as a group that I think really, really helps. You know, we're all sort of answerable to each other. So that really helps in that sense in terms of setting and achieving the goal. But psychologically getting through those tough times, there's all sorts of sort of psychological techniques you can use, you know, distraction techniques,

associative and dissociative techniques. But sometimes you can't, sometimes the run is too hard and you don't complete it. And I think one of the most important lessons our students learn is developing self-compassion. And you know what, sometimes things don't work out the way you planned. Sometimes you don't achieve the thing

you wanted to do that day. Doesn't mean you give up completely, just means you reset, you go again tomorrow. And that's a really key lesson, I think, for life for these students is resilience, sort of overcoming adversity and going again. Can I ask you about the little games that you play with your mind to kind of keep it operating?

I mean, some people will count footsteps, some people will count cracks in sidewalk or telephone poles, what have you. What do you do to put your brain out of the moment and let your body keep hustling? Yeah, so some of those things, so counting footsteps, or I would name, let's say a boy's name for every letter of the alphabet,

every time a left foot goes down, and then I do the girl's ones, every time a right foot goes down, count to 100. Yeah, some really good stuff. So that's all dissociative techniques. So you're taking your brain away from what you're doing. So you might look up at the sky and appreciate the lovely weather, certainly expressing some gratitude for the fact that you're physically able to do this when there's many, many people who can't. I think that really helps me sometimes and reflecting on people I've known in my life who haven't been able to do things physically, you know, being grateful for being in that position. But then there's some

associative techniques you can do as well. You actually do focus on your form, your footsteps, your breathing, and you kind of mentally check in and do a body scan of how you're feeling and where the pain is. So I kind of switch between some of those things. Chatting to other people is a good one as well. Complementing others. Smiling is a great one. Smiling helps reduce the pain and the exertion that you're going through. That's a strong technique. I just have a couple of minutes left. Have you learned in this work, have you come to understand why it is we do this to ourselves? It's not just marathon running. The ultras

are really powerful now, people running 100 mile races and what have you. And if you stand on the side of the road, as people did on the weekend watching a marathon, you see people doing things that they thought they couldn't possibly do. Do you have a sense as to why we put ourselves through this? I think we've all got a bit of an innate need to challenge ourselves, to push boundaries.

I think running particularly is a really interesting vehicle for that in that you progress really quickly and you can see your progress very quickly and reflect on how far you've come. And I think, you know, where is the edge? What's the limit of what we can do? So yeah, once you run a marathon, maybe an ultra is on your radar if I can do that. It was a bit like me, you know, if my friend can do a half, maybe I can do a half. If I can do a half, maybe I can do a marathon. You just kind of keep pushing yourself. I think there's a natural human curiosity about our limits. But you also said something really interesting

which is that if somebody hits their limit, maybe they had to stop, maybe it didn't work out, that you give yourself some grace, right? Absolutely, yeah, I know you have to do that. I think certainly during training, that's absolutely key. But once you're there on the start line, if you've got to the start line injury free and you've completed all your training over 16, 18 weeks, whatever it might be.

If you've done your training right, the marathon should actually be quite enjoyable. It should be kind of a thing you can get through it and reflect positively on. Um, but yeah, I think the temptation to see how far you can go is, is a strong one. Perhaps less enjoyable the day after. There's a lot of people right now who have sore knees and sore backs and sore feet and just about sore everything else. Yeah. Walking downstairs isn't much fun the day after a marathon.

There seems to be a fairly common pattern of crossing the line saying, I'll never do that ever again. And then immediately signing up for another one that comes six months down the road. What upcoming races there might be. Yeah. Some kind of sadistic need to go and do it again. Fran, thank you very much for this. No worries at all, nice to talk to you.

Fran Gaurad-Kohl is the deputy head of the School of Psychology and Sports Science at Bangor University in Wales. She oversees a course called Born to Run, Achieve Your Goals. It teaches university students how to run a marathon.